growth and sex are not linear
I was at a friend’s house the other day and noticed their kids’ growth charts hung on the side of the fridge. Their heights and weights carefully plotted out with a lovely straight line connecting them from their birth, up through the most recent time they were measured. It occurred to me that this is how growth happens when we are kids. Assuming everything is working the way that it’s supposed to, we get bigger and taller. We learn to roll ourselves over, then sit up, then crawl, walk, run. The alphabet becomes words that we string together into sentences, and then paragraphs, and then whole pages. Capacity and complexity growing ever wider, deeper, and larger as the years go by.
Similarly, we learn that sex is supposed to go arousal, intercourse, orgasm. Sensation and pleasure getting bigger, stronger, more intense with each breath and every thrust.
We’re told that this is the only way that growth and sex happen, and if it’s not happening like this, something is wrong.
Sure, we have the adage, “two steps forward, one step back.” But even that is rather linear, leaving little room for deviation.
In my experience, growth looks something like this:
Two steps forward.
One to the side.
One back.
Jump through a ring of fire.
Spin around.
Touch the ground.
Trip and fall and skin your knee.
Get up.
Regroup.
Wipe your tears.
Deep breath.
Take another step.
Look around.
Breathe.
And another step.
Our arousal happens similarly (hopefully without the ring of fire – unless that’s your thing), cycling between excitement and enjoyment, excitement and enjoyment. Building and then relaxing. Taking the shape not of a rocket launching into orbit, but of waves lapping at the shore, surging and falling with the tides.
When we begin to make room for these very natural process, more pleasure and more growth become possible. When we stop trying to fit ourselves into what someone told us to expect and instead begin to get curious about what is already happening, without effort, a kind of freedom emerges.
My suggestion here is not that you simply sit back, laissez-faire, wait and see. But rather than focus on the outcome you’re after, I would encourage you to put your attention on the context. The set and setting. Create the conditions needed for you to make your way to what you’re after. Whether that’s growing your business, or getting turned on. This allows for your unique process to unfold with support and guidance, and without the pressure of forced linearity.
